The planet
The term ‘planet’ relates to the four pillars talked about in fashion business, Planet is the pillar that focuses on aspects of sustainability within the environment. The topic of sustainability is highly relevant to the fashion industry. The main sdg which this is focused on more is clean water and sanitation. This is responsible for 10 percent of human caused greenhouse gas emissions and 20 percent of global wastewater uses more than the aviation and transporting combined (Renee Cho, 2019). The fashion industry also consumes 93million Tonnes/year of clean drinking water which can be more than what the whole Americans drink annually (Renee Cho, 2019). The fashion industry can also be very harmful to farmers and workers who produce garments in the fashion industry. From how damaging this is to the planet it is hard to just talk about the planet therefore Farmers are at major health risks as they spray their crops with pesticides which can increase the growth of cotton so they can keep up with the demand of trends as they have about 52 micro seasons per year. The spraying of different pesticides on plants can cause massive health risks. Spraying crops with harmful chemicals has a lot of effect on the environment as well as the farmers as these chemicals can contaminate all the soil and drinking water as they can leak into different waterways, which locals will drink and use every day (Emily Farra, 2022). Deforestation within the fashion industry has a massive effect on the planet as well as causing disruptive footprints in the forest. The impact on deforestation comes from manufacturing textiles as there are many fabrics which are from plant pulps. Plant pulps can be found in shirts, trousers, and the rubber in all our shoes (Emma Hakansson,2022).
As consumers and fashion brands there are different ways that consumers and brands can help the planet by not having as many micros seasons therefore farmers would not have to keep up with the demand of cotton and brands could focus on sourcing their materials more ethically and having time to reuse materials. Such as the brand Pangaia which does not rely on different trends of each season as they do not change their stock weekly or monthly, they use materials which can be upcycled and use nontoxic dyes in all their products, they also use compostable packaging which means they are reducing the amount plastics which goes back into the environment. By doing this Pangaia can reduce the amount of water used and wasted (Brookes Roberts-Islam,2021).